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Two leading House and Senate committees pledged to hold hearings on the recent gyrations in the stock market as lawmakers voiced bipartisan outrage at platforms that curbed trades in companies like GameStop Corp. that were fueled by the social media site Reddit.
Roberts was there with Ocasio-Cortez's brother Gabriel (black suit and glasses) and her mother Blanca (who held the Bible for her daughter). Roberts is the tall, bearded gentleman at the far right. A Texas man who posted numerous comments and images on social media showing him participating in the U.S. Capitol riots on Jan. 6, including a tweet calling for the assassination of Congresswoman.
“People on Wall Street only care about the rules when they’re the ones getting hurt. American workers have known for years the Wall Street system is broken — they’ve been paying the price,” incoming Senate Banking Chairman Sherrod Brown said in a statement. “It’s time for the SEC and Congress to make the economy work for everyone, not just Wall Street.”
Representative Maxine Waters, chair of the House Financial Services Committee, also promised a hearing focused on recent market instability and role played by hedge funds.
While neither Brown nor Waters announced dates for their respective hearings, a rare bipartisan collection of lawmakers spoke up to criticize platforms like Robinhood Markets Inc. for limiting trading in some stocks, saying it unfairly disadvantages regular people who should be allowed to trade as freely as hedge funds.
Response of Ocasio-Cortez, Warren
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called recent trades “interesting,” and said relevant agencies should examine the issue. Progressive Democrats including Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Elizabeth Warren, as well as GOP Senator Pat Toomey, said the moves merit closer regulatory scrutiny.
“It’s turned into a casino so that market manipulators come in and they drive markets up or down and make a profit on it,” Warren said of the stock market on CNBC. “The billionaires and some hedge funds are yelling because they’re not the ones, the only ones, who make money when the manipulation works.”
Toomey, who’s poised to become the top Republican on the Senate banking panel, said he’s disturbed by Robinhood and other platforms blocking trades.
“I find it very disturbing that a platform would suddenly freeze out investors,” Toomey said. “People should be free to make the investment decisions they choose.”
Impact on ‘Everyday Investors’
In announcing a plan for action, Waters noted the “long history of predatory conduct” by hedge funds, adding that “private funds preying on the pension funds of hard working Americans must be stopped.”
“I will convene a hearing to examine the recent activity around GameStop stock and other impacted stocks with a focus on short selling, online trading platforms, gamification and their systemic impact on our capital markets and retail investors,” the California lawmaker said in a statement.
Representative Patrick McHenry, the top Republican on the panel, said he “wants to open up markets to everyday investors” and is “watching the GameStop issue with absolute fascination.”
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“If there has been market manipulation, fraud, or any pump-and-dump schemes, that obviously needs to be fully investigated,” McHenry said.
Ocasio-Cortez, also a member of the House Financial Services Committee, tweeted earlier that “we now need to know more about @RobinhoodApp’s decision to block retail investors from purchasing stock while hedge funds are freely able to trade the stock as they see fit.”
Gensler Nomination Delayed
GameStop’s volatile trading briefly pushed the stock to No. 1 on the Russell 2000 Index on Thursday, despite the trading restrictions. But shares then fell as much as 68% from their high and trading was halted for the second time on Thursday. Shares in GameStop, a retail chain that sells new and used video games, closed down 44% Thursday at $193.60.
Jared Bernstein, a member of President Joe Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers, said the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is looking into the trading frenzy. But he suggested the situation was merely a symptom of broader inequality in the U.S. economy.
“For me, and for the president, where this goes is that we’re not going to measure our progress by the stock market,” Bernstein said on CNN. “You’ve got a booming stock market and you’ve got rising poverty. That is at the core of the problem that we are trying to solve, not just in the near term but lastingly.”
The Senate Banking Committee hasn’t scheduled a hearing to confirm Gary Gensler, Biden’s pick to lead the SEC, leaving the agency with an acting chair for weeks — or potentially even months.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said she didn’t have specific information about Gensler’s confirmation timetable, as the Senate works through Biden’s cabinet-level nominees first.
Democrats assumed control of the Senate last week, and confirmation votes have moved slowly as Democratic and Republican leaders negotiate how to organize committees.
“The president has spoken about the urgency of getting his team in place to address the range of issues we’re facing and I don’t think that would be any different for Mr. Gensler,” Psaki said, adding that Biden is being briefed by his economic team.
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Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Thursday once again called on Sen. Ted Cruz to resign, while taking the Texan to task for his role in inciting the January 6 attack by supporters of former President Donald Trump on the U.S. Capitol that the congresswoman says nearly ended her life.
Her suggestion followed Democrats' call for a congressional investigation of Robinhood, the free securities trading app at the center of the GameStop controversy, and what Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) called its 'decision to block retail investors from purchasing stock while hedge funds are freely able to trade the stock as they see fit.'
'Happy to work w/ almost any other GOP that aren't trying to get me killed.'
—Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
As Common Dreamsreported earlier Thursday, the retail video game store GameStop 'is now at the center of an explosive fiasco on Wall Street in which major investment firms and hedge funds got taken to the cleaners by users of an online message board, namely the Reddit sub-page r/WallStreetBets, who mobilized collectively to drive up the company's stock price at a moment when many large, institutional investors had placed large bets for it to go down.'
Cruz (R-Texas) tweeted that he agreed with Ocasio-Cortez's assessment, but she rejected the fleeting display of bipartisanship in light of the events of January 6.
As Mother Jones' Inae Oh put it, 'After Ted Cruz attempted to get cute and show some rare agreement with the New York congresswoman by joining her criticism of the trading app Robinhood for blocking certain GameStop trades, Ocasio-Cortez promptly told Cruz to fuck off.'
Here's what it looked like:
I am happy to work with Republicans on this issue where there’s common ground, but you almost had me murdered 3 weeks ago so you can sit this one out.
Happy to work w/ almost any other GOP that aren’t trying to get me killed.
In the meantime if you want to help, you can resign. https://t.co/4mVREbaqqm
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 28, 2021
You haven’t even apologized for the serious physical + mental harm you contributed to from Capitol Police & custodial workers to your own fellow members of Congress.
In the meantime, you can get off my timeline & stop clout-chasing. Thanks.
Happy to work with other GOP on this.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 28, 2021
That wasn't the end of it. After Cruz reportedly fumed about 'partisan rage and anger on the Democratic side,' Ocasio-Cortez shot back: 'Now why would there be anger that Cruz amplified known lies about our election that fueled an insurrection that cost [people's] lives? What does he think the logical response to his lies should be? A hug?'
“We need healing + unity, but I will not take any responsibility for my actions, nor will I acknowledge the contributions my lies made to the violence or the harm that it caused, nor do I believe anyone should be held accountable. But if you’re mad at that you’re divisive.” - GOP
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— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 28, 2021
Much proverbial popcorn was passed:
looking forward to Ted Cruz' op-ed about how AOC is censoring him by telling him to STFU https://t.co/ZFjlFIXApL
— Evan Greer (@evan_greer) January 28, 2021
It’s getting weirder and weirder.
— Marianne Williamson (@marwilliamson) January 28, 2021
Ocasio-Cortez described the seriousness of the events of January 6 in a poignant Instagram Live video earlier this month in which she called the Capitol attack 'a pretty traumatizing event.'
Ocasio-Cortez and other lawmakers were inside the Capitol and in the process of certifying the Electoral College vote for President Joe Biden when a massive mob, inflamed by Trump's lies and conspiracy theories about a 'stolen election' also spread by Cruz and other Republicans, overran the complex.
Five people died in the ensuing mayhem as lawmakers—including numerous maskless coronavirus-spreading Republicans and at least one GOP member who has menaced Squad members before—scrambled for the security of a safe room.
'I can tell you that I had a very close encounter where I thought I was going to die,' Ocasio-Cortez said in the video. 'I did not know if I was going to make it to the end of that day alive.'
Ocasio-Cortez subsequently called on Cruz, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), and other GOP inciters to resign.
'Sen. Cruz, you must accept responsibility for how your craven, self-serving actions contributed to the deaths of four people yesterday,' she tweeted on January 7, hours before United States Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick died from injuries caused by the mob.
“Let's bring up a vote to expel Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley from the Senate.” -@AOCpic.twitter.com/rHvZgpGoHX
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— Justice Democrats (@justicedems) January 22, 2021
How To Contact Alexandria Ocasio Cortez
Ocasio-Cortez has since repeated calls for Cruz, Hawley, and other insurrectionist Republicans to be expelled from Congress.